METROPOLITAN DIARY
Measure Twice
Dear Diary:
Some years ago, I helped drive a panel truck filled with about a dozen weighty sculptures from Omaha to a gallery in SoHo. My companion on the trip was Lee Lubbers, a sculptor and Jesuit priest at Creighton University.
His medium at the time was recycled railroad boxcar axles. He heated them in a huge oven belonging to the Union Pacific Railroad and then, using a giant hydraulic anvil, forged them into modern steel menhir that weighed three-quarters of a ton and were about 11½ feet tall.
We were assured twice before leaving for New York that the gallery had a 12-foot ceiling.
After arriving on a cold, gray afternoon, we unloaded the first of the sculptures and tried to erect it, only to discover the gallery’s 12-foot ceiling had apparently shrunk to about 11 feet.
We retreated to a nearby shop to discuss our options over coffee. There was only one other person, a woman, there, and she clearly had not been served yet. She sat at a small table, seemingly unable to get the attention of the man who served us.
After continuing to ignore her for a while, he finally looked at her.
“What’s wrong with you?” he said in an annoyed tone.
“I’m not feeling well,” the woman replied.
“When you’re not feeling well,” he said after a pause, “you go to the doctor, not to the deli.”
“I just came from the doctor,” she said.
“What did the doctor say?”
“He said go down to the deli and get yourself a cup of tea.”
— Michael M. Dorcy
All Night Parking
Dear Diary:
One night, after searching for parking in Washington Heights for almost an hour, I reluctantly decided to put my car in a garage.
Finding one, I asked the attendant if they took cars overnight.
Yes, he said, for $40.
As I reached into my wallet, the attendant motioned toward me and then pointed to a car parked in a spot just outside the garage entrance.
Although he didn’t speak English very well and I didn’t really understand what he was saying, I realized that the car he was pointing to was his. It soon became clear that he was offering me his spot instead — for $25 in cash.
A few minutes later, I was happily walking to my destination, and he was enjoying the fruits of an enterprising approach to solving my parking problem.
— Jean Molot
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/13/nyregion/metropolitan-diary.html
